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Mock render system

Posted: Tue Jan 25, 2011 3:31 pm
by al2950
I know this topic has been mentioned a few times in the past, and I am not sure it really fits under the title of a "Papercut".

However building an engine around Ogre will normally involve some decent testing and often some form of auto build system. Anyway, when testing the logic of your code you do not, or even sometimes cannot, launch a 3D window to do so (I am thinking more Auto build systems). So can I reopen the discussions about creating a mock render system which will still let Ogre run but not need any 3d hardware or drivers.

Re: Mock render system

Posted: Tue Jan 25, 2011 3:47 pm
by so0os
Do you mean Null Renderer? or software rendering?

Re: Mock render system

Posted: Tue Jan 25, 2011 3:47 pm
by betajaen
Your talking about a NullRenderer. It's been discussed to death for a very long time now and there should be a few threads about various efforts.

It isn't really a paper cut though.

Re: Mock render system

Posted: Tue Jan 25, 2011 4:00 pm
by so0os
betajaen's right, think such renderer would have to do everything that normal renderer does to suffice calls to hardware buffers and such, and it would do it all in CPU too, i bet that would be slower than an actual renderer

Re: Mock render system

Posted: Tue Jan 25, 2011 4:12 pm
by al2950
Yeah i know its been talked to death before and probably not a papercut! Its just something I need!! :D. As i have not looked at the render systems at all in Ogre, can anyone give me any idea how much effort it would be to create a NULL renderer, ie one that does no 3D calculations but still lets the system run. (NOT a software renderer)?

Re: Mock render system

Posted: Tue Jan 25, 2011 4:20 pm
by so0os
Dirty hacks ftw!

Code: Select all

ShowWindow(mRenderWindow->getcustomAttribute("WINDOW"),SW_HIDE);

Re: Mock render system

Posted: Tue Jan 25, 2011 4:41 pm
by betajaen
al2950 wrote:Yeah i know its been talked to death before and probably not a papercut! Its just something I need!! :D. As i have not looked at the render systems at all in Ogre, can anyone give me any idea how much effort it would be to create a NULL renderer, ie one that does no 3D calculations but still lets the system run. (NOT a software renderer)?
You'd effectively have to design an Ogre Render System. At least, you'd have to fill out every required function and give an expected result. It's quite complicated which why nobody hasn't written one yet.

Re: Mock render system

Posted: Tue Jan 25, 2011 5:59 pm
by syedhs
Actually there were already aquite a few attempts to write a null renderer, you can read about it here. There file there is still download-able, but need some love to port it to at least 1.7.x.

Re: Mock render system

Posted: Tue Jan 25, 2011 10:08 pm
by al2950
@syedhs Thank you very much. I must admit i tried everything apart from "null" renderer when searching the forums :oops:

Re: Mock render system

Posted: Wed Jan 26, 2011 3:42 am
by jacmoe
If this was a papercut, it would require a **MONSTROUS** pair of scissors! :D

I think someone actually did make mock rendersystem, to be honest.
Can't be [s]arsed[/s] bothered to find the topic right now, but it should be easy enough: search for 'mock' in Using Ogre in Practice. :wink:

Re: Mock render system

Posted: Wed Jan 26, 2011 8:04 am
by xavier
Moved to Feature Requests (this is *so* NOT a Papercut) and locked.